40 Things I Learnt In 40 Years

Adetutu continues her 40th birthday celebration with a piece on the lessons she has learnt. We resume normal service after this.

Let us brag… *sashays and twists while blowing kisses*

In case you don’t know, I am 40 years old now, and there’s this way we 40+ people carry ourselves with grace. All of you stuck in your 30s better take several seats and let us educate you. Oju ti ri, and for those who don’t understand Yoruba, my native language, that simply means “eyes don see plenty things”.

Let us cut the chase and dive into the 40 things I have learnt as I clock 40. Anyways, I’m over 40 already. I should sound a note of warning – no shalaye this time; alaye forty no dey shalaye. Just the lessons I have learnt.

1. One person can see you as the greatest person in their life while someone else can see you as the worst person their life.

• You can lie down for people to walk on you and they still complain that you are not lying flat enough.

• No one stays with you permanently; learn to survive alone.

• Moving on doesn’t mean you forget about things; it just means you have to accept what happened and continue living.

• You don’t know pain until you crave a conversation with someone who is no longer alive.

• People have so many good things to say about you but you have to die first.

• In the end, it’s not the years in your life that count, It’s life in your years.

• The worst mistake any human can make is to postpone living. There will never be the right time to live life, just live in the moment.

• Sometimes, it takes 10 years to get to that 1 year that will change your life. Keep plugging away.

1. We are not here long enough to be living unhappy.

1. That it didn’t happen wasn’t because you didn’t give it your best. Might not be your season yet.

1. You can’t own people; you can only experience them.

1. I’ve seen people work hard, do their best, have a good heart and all. Yet nothing works for them. If God has shown you favour, don’t call others lazy.

1. Until you are in your season, you are going to look lazy and the world might see you as clueless while you wait for harvest.

1. No matter how good a person you are, you will always be bad in someone’s story.

1. For your peace of mind, do not try to understand everything.

1. We are all just a car crash, a diagnosis, an unexpected phone call, a new found love or a broken heart away from becoming a completely different person.

1. You’ll never truly understand Marriages, Divorces, Child birth, Death of a loved one or Parenting until it actually happens to you. Theories and assumptions of situations in life are not realities.

1. There’s no bond that cannot be broken; there are no ties that cannot be severed and absolutely nothing will happen. You will wake up the next morning and it will be just another day.

• Not every ‘association’ is meant to be a forever kind of thing. If you ever want to find happiness, you have to learn to be okay with that.

• As long as you know your heart and intentions are pure, don’t explain yourself to anyone. In other words, resist the urge to shalaye.

• One of the saddest truths about life is that the show must go on. Whether you are sad, tired, heartbroken, ill or depressed; you still have to get up and get things going.

• Everyone in your life will have a last day with you and you don’t even know when that will be.

• Stop chasing the wrong one; the right one won’t run.

• You can’t make someone love you by giving them more of what they already don’t appreciate.

• The people you sacrifice everything for can tell you one day that they never forced you to do anything for them.

• One of the hardest lessons we face in life is learning how to let go and accept when a person’s part in our story is over.

• Anybody can switch up on you no matter the history or bond.

• Strength is when you heal your wounds instead of spreading the pain.

• Some people will never appreciate what you bring to the table until they watch you in action at another table.

• The people you love don’t know how inaccessible you are to other people until they become ‘other people’.

• Deep down, you know exactly where you stand with someone but hope blurs the lines a bit.

• Loyalty isn’t grey; it is either black or white. You are either completely loyal or not loyal at all.

• Celebrate yourself; nobody knows what it takes to be you.

• It is easy to preach the sermon when life has not happened to you. General rules don’t apply.

• The grass is not always greener on the other side.

• You are not always going to get the closure or explanation you think you deserve.

• Hurt people, hurt people.

• Life is like a game with many levels. You are sometimes stuck on one level and you keep trying so hard to leave that level for the next not knowing the level you are trying so hard to move to is much harder than where you are coming from.

• You are in charge of your own happiness.

Now that you have read the 40 things I have learnt, let me know what you think.

I cover my pen and release myself from hypergraphia to go back to doing the kurukere that gives me my daily 2k.

HEAL! By ‘Lanre Bucknor

Hi guys. I was gonna resume my ‘Musings’ after the events of the last few days but it turned out that the ‘moon’ served up excess ‘honey’. Anyways, let’s enjoy @lordrooz, as he enjoins us to ‘HEAL!’. Please enjoy, and use the comment box below

Heal!
Not because everyone
Wants you to
But
Because you have to
You need to

Heal!
Because you must
For yourself
And maybe
For someone else

Heal!
Because it’s the only thing
Holding you back
From being the dream
Of someone
Out there,
Waiting,
Praying
And maybe, just maybe
Longing,
To have you
In their arms,
Heart
and life

Heal!
Because you must!
You have to
For that special person

Please dear,
Go through this process
This Slow,
painful process

Do nothing else
After this

Just heal!

–  Heal.
‘Lanre Bucknor
@lordrooz

‘Lanre Bucknor writes from Lagos. He is always in a healing process because he learns everyday. He holds one word close to his heart and that word is SINCERITY.
‘Lanre can be found on twitter and Instagram via @lordrooz

LA VIDA LOCA (POETRY ) BY ‘LANRE BUCKNOR

La vida Loca

My rhymes are very local

Just like the mathematical loci

I will never remain docile.

 

La vida Loca

My love for you always is total

Not like the Baba Ijebu “TOTA”

It will never leave you in tatters

 

My Prima Donna

Our love will flourish in the fauna

You! my heart, my soul, my Querida

With you I belong, my Queen Madonna

 

La Vida Loca

‘Dola called me ‘local rhymer’

Buttressed by Oscar ma Nigga

They both agree I ain’t a slacker

 

Let’s sing La vida Loca

My rhymes are still very local

For You, my girl, I remain loyal

For You, my voice shall remain vocal

Viva my Super diva!

You are the joker in my poker

The magic Vaccine that cures the fever

With you around,  I am always a Sizzler!

 

‘Lanre Bucknor writes lazily from Lagos and wrote from Bida at some point. ‘Lanre gets inspired by so many thoughts, words and actions but too lazy to articulate them on paper. inspiration usually comes from the bathroom but by the time he wraps his towel around his tiny waist, he would have forgotten.

‘Lanre is on twitter and instagram as @lordrooz.

AMEBO BY KAYGEEGAL

Kaygeegal writes about the many tell tales in our daily life. Enjoy AMEBO, and remember to use the comment box. We appreciate feedback a lot. Thanks

The breeze blew
Harmonizing the hushes after stories
But I have heard…they were talking about me
About my hobby.

She said I’m a lazy seer

Prophetizing a wreckage future.
But I am no seer

I only emit things I see

I told the landlord that brother Jero helps rock his boat
Afterall he needs help down there.

Was I a lazy seer when I prophesied that Lere would die of black heart?
I alone see her around Sikiru 
When all hens shed their chickens at his presence
She dwells with him in the dark

I rock on my stool…listening
She that cast my news knows why 
Her beau laced her with that black rope I know nothing of
She should rejoice I see things
Her naive listener’s husband would have  climbed the unclimbed.

Am I still a lazy seer?
Am I wrong in protecting them all like a great shepherd?
Should I tell her now that her beau just escaped to the Corper’s chamber? 
Naaaaah…let her enjoy my tales with her listener
By my stool, they shall all pass

The writer is on twitter as @kaygeegal. She writes for leisure and pleasure

MY SMOOCH STIFLER (POETRY) BY ‘LANRE BUCKNOR

 

 

 

This happens to be the first post here this year. I remember promising that I would write more often. While I have failed in that regard, I still have the opportunity to make it right. For today, enjoy ‘Lanre Bucknor’s writing. Its quite a humorous read. Don’t forget to use the comment box too

As much as I want the beards
It has refused to heed my call
As much as I crave the beards
It has refused to yield result

Age has moved in geometrics
Beards chose to be arithmetic
If age were to be the metrics
Maybe mine would have been a matrix

One have seen the womenfolk adorn it
Even though they cherish it not
But not everyone of us chose to be apes
‘Cos some even remove with tapes

The quantity of hair elsewhere swells
Even though one wants them less
Like a military man bound by the code
Hair in the jaw region has refused to grow

Allison coke carves with mischevious smile
Same funny smirks that comes in phase
Methylated spirit wouldn’t change my case
As I have discovered beard gang isn’t my fate

Beard would serve some of us well
Most of us already going bald
For dual purpose in sunnah and gang
For maturity in wisdom and class

Picture Credit: http://www.google.com

 ‘Lanre is not particularly bald but have a receding hairline. He craves having beards but unfortunately for him so far, he hasn’t been able to keep a full one. Well, he is on twitter as @lordrooz